Lesia's Dream

by Laura Langston

  Sonia pulled out of her arms and sat up. “The white powder is on the ground. Look.”

  Lesia tossed the thin blanket aside, grabbed her coat and wrapped it around her shoulders.

  Sonia ran to the window and peered through the wavy glass. “See!”

  “Shhh.” Lesia held a cautionary finger to her lips and directed a worried glance towards Mama and Adam. Relieved to see that they were still sleeping, she joined Sonia.

  After drifting from the sky for days but never setding, snow now clung like a thick coating of flour to the ground, the trees, the woodpile. Andrew had told her she would wake to winter one morning, and he had been right. Trouble was, she’d thought she had more time to prepare.

  “We have to hurry and get the cabbages in.” She sat Sonia down with a small piece of bread.

  “I good at helping,” the litde girl whispered back.

  Keeping one eye on Mama and Adam, who slept on top of the oven, Lesia grabbed the small pieces of wood she’d brought in last night and laid them on the still-glowing embers. They caught almost immediately. Praise to Mother Mary herself for Andrew and Wasyl’s oven!

  So much had happened in the last month. Andrew had gone back to his farm, where he’d gathered equipment and rounded up four more men. Together, they had pulled and sweated and grunted their way across the prairie, clearing the last six acres so fast Lesia was dizzy with the speed of it.

  Soon after, Wasyl and the four other men had disappeared. That’s when Andrew had told her he was knocking out the side of the burdei for a built-in clay oven. Panicked at the thought of losing any part of the burdei, she’d argued against it. But Andrew had patiently drawn a picture on one of her precious pieces of paper. He had shown her how there would be an opening for baking, a metal plate for cooking and a long, flat top that would give someone a warm place to sleep at night. It wouldn’t be as fancy as a store-bought tin stove, he warned, but it would do.

  Lesia couldn’t imagine when they would ever have money for a store-bought tin stove, so she said yes to Andrew’s idea.

  Sure that the fire had caught, Lesia gulped down a piece of bread and hustled Sonia outside, giving thanks once again for Papa’s window and the crude wooden door Wasyl had nailed together. She shuddered to think how cold they would be without them.

  The world was beautiful and clean and pure. It was a hush of white, a crunch of footfall, a taste of crispness. If only Papa and Ivan could be there to see it. If only, if only.

  “Look! Look at me.” Sonia jumped up and down, making little footprints everywhere she went.

  Lesia stuck her tongue into the air. Small white flakes melted with tiny stings as they hit her mouth and her cheeks.

  Everyone said winter on the prairies was harsh and unforgiving, but this wasn’t so bad. She could still see grass under the snow. And the woodpile was barely brushed with white.

  “Only one itty bitty egg, Lessie.”

  “It’s probably the last one till spring.” She tossed the birds a handful of poppy seeds and headed towards the creek.

  Snow had turned the shrubs into strange and magical shapes; tree branches looked like twisted black-and-white pencils against the sky. “Let’s check the traps.”

  All three were empty. It had been weeks since they’d caught a rabbit. And Papa had used the last of the shotgun shells before he’d left for Winnipeg.

  It took Lesia a long time to carry all the cabbages inside. By then, Mama had fed Adam and was starting to shred the large heads. “Traps empty?” She raised an eyebrow.

  Mutely, Lesia nodded.

  Mama’s hands moved rhythmically over the cabbage. “Perhaps today Papa and Ivan will return.” Her eyes glistened with hope. “Or maybe Andrew will come with our flour.”

  There had been no word about Papa and Ivan since the day they had learned of their imprisonment. Andrew had said he would ask again when he went to town with their eggs.

  Their tears had stopped long ago. Mama relied on a quiet faith to see her through the days; Lesia wrestled with a bitter combination of anger, fear and constant worry.

  Where were they? How were they? What was going to happen to them?

  Forcing her thoughts away, Lesia began layering salt and cabbage in the crock. Andrew had brought both the last time he had visited. Egg money, he’d said. But he’d also returned with a top for the oven and sweets for Sonia. He was doing too much … spending too much from his own pocket.

  When he had left last time with three dozen eggs, Lesia had dared not ask him to buy shotgun shells. Instead, she’d made a point of saying, “Flour only, no extras.”

  But if he did bring extras, Lord God, she prayed it would be the shells.

  By the time Andrew showed up more than a week later, the woodpile, the garden and every tuft of grass were buried under mounds of white. The snow muffled sounds, so Lesia didn’t hear a thing until his loud voice boomed through the burdei door one morning.

  “You awake in there?”

  Lesia grinned and dropped the square of burlap she was turning into a shirt. “Of course we’re awake.” Mama covered up a nursing Adam and Lesia pulled the makeshift door open. “Come in.”

  The cold air clung to his coat like a blanket. “Where do you want this?” He was balancing a sack of flour on one shoulder.

  “Here.” Lesia helped him put it in the corner.

  “There’s more.” He disappeared outside again.

  Sonia clapped her hands in anticipation. Mama smiled. Lesia’s breath caught. Shotgun shells?

  There were no shells. Instead, Pearl and Paul had sent jars of soup, loaves of bread and a very small offering of rich, pale cream. “There’ll be no more till spring now,” Andrew said apologetically as he handed it over to Mama.

  Next he reached into the folds of his sheepskin coat. “Something for you, miss.” He presented Sonia with a multicoloured rag doll. “And for you.” He handed Mama two skeins of wool, one a rich red and the other a brilliant blue. He turned to Lesia.

  “I said no extras.” She was embarrassed by his charity; now she understood how Papa felt at times like this.

  “This is not an extra.” He pulled two small metal hinges from his pocket. “To let the door open and close with ease.”

  Then he pulled a piece of paper from the other pocket of his heavy sheepskin coat and handed it to her.

  Lesia stared at her name written in large, bold script on the front of an official-looking beige envelope. Lesia Magus, Hazelridge, Manitoba. Fingers shaking, she released the flap and pulled out a single sheet of paper.

  Dearest Lesia, she read silently. Papa and I are together in the Brandon camp. We have not been beaten, nor have we starved to death. But I will tell you the truth and you decide whether to tell Mama.

  There are hundreds of us and not enough beds to go around. We get fed three times a day, and I know I should be grateful. But it is slop, not fit to feed to animals. Pails of meat and bread stew. More bread-and-water broth than anything, and what meat there is comes slimed with green. We’ve had potatoes four times—each time they looked like soot and smelled much worse. And twice we’ve had turnip—the pieces were so hard you could cut down trees with them.

  Every day we are outside. First for exercise marches, until we almost drop from exhaustion, and then we are forced to work. Guards stand with their bayonets almost touching us. If we slow down they prod us like oxen. After a while the cold is enough to make grown men weep. Still, we carry on. We work ten hours and are paid twenty-five cents a day. At night we talk of our families to keep up our spirits. We plan for the future and pray there will be one.

  They tell us we may send and receive eight letters a month. I am grateful for the chance to write. And I am more grateful than you will ever know for that paper and pencil Andrew gave you. I hope there is enough left that you may answer me. Papa is so proud you can read and write and he begs you to take care of Mama and the children. Give them all a hug for us, especially my new brother Adam, whom I hope to me
et very soon.

  Your loving brother, Ivan.

  Bozhe! Her eyes filled with tears. Prodded like oxen. Meat slimed with green. She pretended to read the letter a second time, though her eyes were too blurred to focus.

  “It’s from Ivan,” she said softly when she could finally speak around the lump in her throat. “And from Papa.”

  “What do they say?” Mama demanded.

  Lesia recapped the letter, exaggerating what good there was and minimizing the bad.

  When she was finished, Mama looked relieved. “How wonderful that they’re warm and safe and well fed. I’m sure God, in His infinite wisdom, will send them home to us soon.”

  Lesia and Andrew exchanged looks. “Perhaps,” she said softly, not believing it for a minute. “Perhaps.”

  The letters between the homestead and the camp came steadily all through November and into December. Lesia tucked them into Baba’s special box, often taking them out and rereading them late at night, before bed. The weather prevented Andrew from visiting very often, but when he did, he always brought a letter. And Lesia always had a letter ready to send back.

  Those first letters were the best. Everyone was deliriously happy to be in touch and hopeful that they would soon be together again. But as time went on, the letters became predictable and monotonous, just like the depressing greyness of the sky after months of brilliant sun. After a while, entire paragraphs were censored, and, try as she might, Lesia could never make out the words.

  We pray for an end to this situation, Ivan wrote. Papa says borrowing money is wrong, no matter what. I have tried to talk to him, but he refuses to reason. Harsh black strokes prevented her from reading four lines before the letter resumed. There is talk that soon they will allow visitors. We pray this will happen. Your brother, Ivan.

  We think of you always, and Mama and the children send love, Lesia would respond. It has been weeks since we’ve had fresh meat. It is too cold to go outside to check the traps and we have no money for shotgun shells. The flour Andrew brought is dwindling, and our sauerkraut is almost gone. I paid Andrew for the doctor’s bill with the last of the egg money. We dream of fresh eggs and sunshine. We dream of you home safe where you belong. Love, Lesia.

  Once Ivan realized his letters were being censored, he got crafty and the black lines disappeared. I am glad you have enough fresh meat, he wrote. And that your sauerkraut is plentiful. We are all well. The guards are as nice as Michal Stryk. We are building a fence. It is easy work and the pay is good. The food is plentiful and I am sure we will soon be home. Visits are allowed once a month and I really hope (this he had underlined twice) you will come. Thinking of you, Ivan.

  Lesia read between the lines. Life in the camp was harsh and unfriendly. The guards were mean, the work horrific. She didn’t need to go there and witness for herself the shame and humiliation. No. Besides, she was needed at home. She was the only one who could set the traps, and she didn’t dare send Mama out into the cold to check them. Her health was still too fragile.

  We are cold, she wrote back, so we have cut down your sheepskin coat to fit Sonia. She’s growing and had nothing left to wear outside. I’ve made some thick boots from the flour sack but they offer little protection from the cold. Last week I caught a rabbit. Our first in three weeks. Please tell Papa things are desperate. Our food is just about gone. Mama’s milk has dried up and Adam is as thin as a rail. He has almost no energy left to cry. The cold slices us like a knife cutting butter. It leaves us perpetually shaking. Even the chickens are too cold to be outside. That towering woodpile you were so proud of is near the ground now. The Korols give us food when they can, and Andrew too, but I do not like to take advantage. I would rather borrow money than accept so many gifts. Surely Papa will understand. Please answer soon, Lesia.

  Soon enough, Lesia had her answer.

  No debt, Ivan wrote. Winter is long in this place but they are still allowing visitors one Friday a month. Men are being moved almost daily. Some to Kapuskasing, some to a place called Banff. Please come and see us while you still can. Ivan.

  “If you go, perhaps they will let Ivan and Papa come home with you,” Mama whispered later that night as they sat wrapped in blankets in front of the oven.

  “I don’t think so,” Lesia whispered back. Adam slept, but Sonia peered over her blanket as the two women talked. In spite of her worry, Lesia had to smile at those large blue eyes taking it all in. “Go to sleep, little one,” she told the child.

  She turned back to Mama. “I’m going to borrow money from Andrew,” she said. “To buy shells for the shotgun.”

  “Papa forbids it.”

  “Papa isn’t here. He doesn’t have to know.”

  “Lesia!”

  Why had she told Mama the truth when she’d read the last letter? Why hadn’t she lied and pretended Papa had given his permission? She knew it was for the same reason she’d finally told her things were not wonderful at the internment camps: she had to share her pain. “We have to, Mama. It’s our only hope.”

  “No. I forbid it on Papa’s behalf.”

  “Mama, you’re not being reasonable! We need fresh meat. What other choice do we have?”

  “Go to the camp and see the men,” Mama insisted. “We’ll be staying at the Korols’ over Christmas, you can go then. You’ll convince the authorities to let them out, Lesia, I know you will.”

  “They aren’t going to listen to me. I’m a nobody. Besides, Brandon’s hundreds of miles away, Mama. It’s impossible to walk there in this cold.”

  “You’ll have to take the train. Andrew offered to pay your fare. I accepted.”

  “You won’t let me borrow money for shells but you’ll take money for train fare?” The words burst out of her. Sonia giggled and popped her head over the blanket. After settling her sister a second time, Lesia turned disbelieving eyes to Mama. “A small package of shells is less than a dollar. The train to Brandon has to cost ten or twelve dollars.”

  “It’s eight dollars return.”

  All this charity was getting to be too much. “Oh, Mama, how could you?”

  “How could I not?” Mama met her gaze unflinchingly. “Andrew offered it as a gift and I accepted. It’s easy to lock a man away, but not so easy to turn your back on his daughter when she stands there begging for his release.”

  Mama expected her to beg?

  “Andrew will drop you at the train in Hazelridge. You’ll make the connection in Winnipeg and be in Brandon just after noon on Friday, the sixth,” Mama said. “That leaves you several hours to get to the camp and still make the train back in time for the celebration.”

  Lesia gasped. “You’d have me go there on the Holy Eve?”

  “If that’s what it takes.”

  “You go, Mama.” The thought of seeing beloved Papa and Ivan behind bars was enough to make her sick with shame and full of loathing. Loathing for herself. Why had she thought coming to Canada would make life better?

  “I can’t leave Adam and Sonia for that long,” Mama explained. “And Andrew offered money for only one fare. You must go, Lesia. If they are moved to another camp, we might never see them again.”

  Bozhe! Couldn’t Mama understand? “What if…” Her lower hp quivered. “What if they keep me there?” she whispered thickly.

  “They can’t do that. You’ve done nothing wrong.”

  “Neither have Papa and Ivan.”

  Mama stared at Lesia a long time before dropping her eyes. “I don’t understand this mess.”

  “Neither do I.” But there was one thing Lesia did understand. She had to go to Brandon. She had to go and talk some sense into Papa. She also had to go because, Lord God forbid, if they were moved and she never saw them again, she’d have more pain, more guilt and more reasons to loathe herself.

  Chapter Fifteen

  January 6,1915

  Brandon, Manitoba

  The cold air stung Lesia’s eyes and made her chest ache with each breath. The bitter wind swirled the snow in
to whirling dervishes at her feet. Clutching the basket of goodies Pearl had assembled that morning, she stared at the grey wooden building.

  The Brandon Winter Fair Arena. Papa’s and Ivan’s jail.

  It was low to the ground, only a storey and a half, but it was huge, five or six times the size of Master Stryk’s mansion. Unlike the landowner’s mansion, however, two armed guards stood watch on either side of large double doors.

  Lesia had been worried about getting lost when she got off the train. Andrew had told her to simply ask for directions, but in the end she hadn’t needed to. There had been a number of other Ukrainians on the train from Winnipeg to Brandon, and, by the bits of conversation she had overheard, Lesia knew they were heading for the same place.

  Many of these people carried baskets or packages wrapped with string. Their clothes were worn, their shoulders were hunched, their faces were filled with fear. Just like her. And just like her, they were taking advantage of the last visiting day before Holy Eve.

  Lesia reached the bottom of the stairs and joined the line of people waiting to be cleared by the guards.

  “Hurry up, hurry up!” a voice from behind grumbled in Ukrainian.

  She resisted the urge to turn around and flee. Instead, she inched her way towards the top of the stairs, wishing she could see what the guards were doing. Her view was blocked by the broad shoulders of a woman who was struggling to control two active, red-haired sons.

  Finally, it was Lesia’s turn.

  A barrel-chested man with a huge curled moustache put out his hand. Shifting the basket, she fumbled for her citizenship papers. He rolled his eyes and made a snickering comment to the other guard. Both men laughed. She studied the shiny gold buttons on his blue coat, the starched collar that hugged his neck. How embarrassing to be treated this way.